


The World is Heavy When It's On Your Shoulders

by Leucoxia



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: A Talk about Morality, Aang (Avatar) Needs a Hug, Aang (Avatar)-centric, Aangst, Aged-Up Character(s), Air Nomad Genocide (Avatar), Airbending & Airbenders, And by the time you notice it's too late, Angst, Blood and Injury, Changed Aang, Character Study, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Injury, POV Katara (Avatar), Pining, Possibilities of Airbending, Post-100 Year War (Avatar TV), Post-Canon, Reunions, Subtle but it's there, Unresolved Emotional Tension, but not the kind you think, through Katara's eyes, war changes people
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-18 18:08:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29122428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leucoxia/pseuds/Leucoxia
Summary: "He was," Here Suki pauses, frowning. "He was," She tries again, her eyes trained toward the stone ceiling, thinking. "Frightening." She finally says after a long while.Katara blinks in surprise. "Frightening?" She couldn't help but echo."Yes," Suki whispers.or;Katara learns what happened to Aang on the day of Sozin's comet, and realizes it had changed him, eight years too late.
Relationships: Aang & Katara (Avatar), Aang/Katara (Avatar), Katara & Sokka (Avatar), Katara & Suki (Avatar), Katara & Zuko (Avatar), Toph Beifong & Katara
Comments: 5
Kudos: 45





	The World is Heavy When It's On Your Shoulders

Katara's forehead is beaded with sweat, her intact arm shaking from the exertion. Her feet skids along the disturbed earth, shaken from the forces of earthbending. Her nose aches from the smell of charred cloth and singed skin. She hisses from the agonizing burn on her right arm. Her shoulder screams in protest as she moves, and instinctively she clutches at it with her other hand. Almost immediately she removes her hand as her shoulder roars in pain, the joint knocked out of place. An arrowhead has lodged itself into the socket, dislocating the bone. Blood flows profusely down her arm, irritating the burns she'd gotten from when a firebending rebel had grabbed her with a tight grip and proceeded to set her skin alight. She'd kicked out blindly, punching forward a stream of water that launched him a few feet away. It was then that an arrow, fired by invisible archers perched on the trees, pierced through her shoulder from behind. Panting, she hovers a swath of glowing water over it as an attempt to heal the wound.

Toph notices her pause and hears her cry of pain. Without preamble, she builds an earthen wall around Katara to protect her while she heals herself. Katara can only sigh her gratitude as Toph leaves to help with the fighting. Despite the war ending over eight years ago, many rebels and fire nation supremacists, though not as much as before, still continue their fight against the Avatar, angry at the fact that he has defeated their Fire Lord and is implementing equality among the nations, thereby removing them from their previous state of power. Some were against the prospect of a united nation—they felt that this was a surefire way to "dirty" their bloodlines by being interspersed with one another. Others held grudges, still bitter from the hundred-year reign of terror brought upon by the Fire Nation and unwilling to cooperate with the new Firelord's attempts at diplomacy. Their attacks are well-timed, their ambushes planned for whenever the Avatar touches unto Earth Kingdom soil. They know they cannot touch him in his air temples, where the mountains are treacherous and hard to climb, nor in the glaciers of the poles, where the Avatar's supporters are strong and the waters are at their disadvantage. Zuko watches his nation like an eaglehawk, always on the lookout for uprisings and extinguishing any signs of rebellion. The Earth Kingdom however, is vast, their people spread wide. It is not difficult to plan a revolt in secret inside their countless labyrinths and caves. Many fire nation rebels and sympathizers had retreated into the countless provinces of the Earth Kingdom to plot and hide, driven out by Zuko's forces.

Aang had arrived a day before, after four years of solitary isolation in the Southern Air Temple. She remembered the day he announced he was leaving. She hadn't understood back then the need for him to retreat into the mountains. The other politicians and diplomats countered his decision severely, too. They were worried that without the Avatar, the people would go restless, and uprisings might happen with which they cannot control without the Avatar's power. Zuko had stood fiercely by his side, saying that the world would not cease to turn if the Avatar were to return to his temples, and that they owed him as much, for all the good he had done. Hakoda had agreed as well, vowing to help with any disturbances, and reluctantly the Earth monarchs assented, the courtroom going quieter as everyone conceded to the Avatar's wishes. Katara, sitting by her father's arm, was especially silent, her mind turning a mile a minute. She listened as Aang assured everyone he could be reached by messenger hawk, and that he would return if ever another great cause of distress were to occur.

When she cornered him in the palace gardens after the meeting was adjourned, she remembered being unusually impassive. "Why didn't you tell me?" Her voice was cold.

Aang had at least the decency to look guilty. "Katara," he started, but didn't continue.

"Why are you leaving?" She pushed. Her voice sounded petulant in her ears. Katara knew, of all people, it would be her who would know the best, that while the Avatar's duty was to the world, Aang was first and foremost an Air Nomad. Katara would not pretend to understand the customs of the monastic lifestyle, and a distant thought in her head whispered that no one else knows best about the monastic lifestyle in this entire world except for the person standing in front of her. Immediately, right as she said it, she deflated, and she could feel her face creasing in defeat.

The guilt in Aang's face disappeared, and in its place, a resolute expression showed. It was the face of a man who has made a final decision, even if it pained him so. He caressed her face, his fingers tucking the stray tendrils of her hair. _In search of enlightenment_ , he had said, his eyes pensive. _There are things I must do._

 _What else? What else do you need to do, other than be with me?_ Katara remembered herself thinking. She was being selfish, she knew. The Avatar could never really belong to her—not fully, not in the way she desperately wanted. She was an earthly attachment, one that he had to let go of to reach his truest potential. She had no right to ask him to choose her over the world. And she knew that leaving him to his thoughts in the temples, allowing him to sort out his turmoils, would only enrich his spiritual connection and enhance his Avatar spirit.

But she knew that if only she would ask, he would stay. Aang loved her like that.

The thought grounded her—the knowledge that here was a powerful man, the most powerful man in this world, and he would do anything for her, including turning his back on his beliefs. Her face softened, then. Katara didn't have to fully understand his intentions, she just had to support him. He had embraced her with such a ferocity that she gladly returned, and only a few tears had escaped her eyes as he kissed her so sweetly for the last time. His forehead rested on her hair and he inhaled, as if committing her scent to memory. The wind that whipped the trees as he flew into the skies was strong, but not as strong as the pain in her heart.

It was an unspoken understanding between them both that his leaving meant the end of their relationship.

When she slept that night, she took away the part of herself that was selfish and had stars in her eyes. It was the girl who listened to Aunt Wu so sincerely as she had her fortune read— _you will marry a powerful bender_ —and the girl who kissed Aang on the quaint tea shop in Ba Sing Se, his lips faintly tasting of tea and victory. She could almost smell the acrid burn of rapidly cooled lava and hear her brother's voice beside her— _sometimes I forget what a powerful bender that kid is_ —and feel the jump her heart gave when he danced with her so passionately in front of everyone— _it's just you and me right now_ —and the determined expression that eclipsed his face when he kissed her on the day of the black sun, ready to give his heart to the world and die. The next day afterward, she had returned to the South Pole and threw herself into her work. She helped rebuild her tribe from the ground up, the years passing by in a series of routines composed mainly of teaching her students, building infrastructure, and enforcing ties with their sister tribe. She had very little time to herself, and even littler time to allow herself to wallow in the sadness that he left in his absence. Sometimes, she would be called by Zuko into the Fire Nation capital for further meetings, and always by her side was Toph, Sokka, and Suki, but never Aang. The first meeting, only a handful of months into his retreat, Zuko had summoned them to the court to discuss the recent surge of rebellion, no doubt taking advantage of the Avatar's absence. She had rushed to the palace, desperate to see Aang after so long, only to deflate as he never showed up. In fact, in every meeting in the next four years, Aang has never attended, not even once, and yet despite his absence the rebellions were easily subdued by the combination of Zuko's army, the Dai Li, the Kyoshi Warriors, and the rest of them. Katara knew that Zuko frequented the air temples, corresponding with the Avatar himself, updating him on the current happenings of the world and seeking advice for conflict he cannot handle without counsel. Toph and Sokka had gone on several occasions as well, but Katara had never joined. She feared that if she saw him, she would break the carefully constructed walls around her heart, and she would allow her selfishness to win. She feared that she would ask him to stay with her, to turn his back on his people and the world. She feared even more that he would no doubt say yes.

One day, Zuko called them all to discuss the possibility of a United Nation. A large swath of land in the Western Earth Kingdom turned into a productive, independent state, with its own working government and economy. It had been Aang's idea. With a quiet voice and a discreet glance her way, Zuko announced that the Avatar was arriving a month from then.

Katara's heart had jolted, the sudden squeeze in her chest a palpable pain. Her throat closed up, her stomach swooped, and bile rose to the back of her tongue. After the meeting, Zuko gestured for her to stay. They walked towards the balcony through an ornate door by the side of the meeting room.

"Are you okay?" Zuko asked, his face worried, his scar tightened at the edges. Katara tried at a smile. She knew that through the years, the Avatar and the Fire Lord had built up a strong and steady friendship—a bond that she could never touch. There was something different between the two of them when they returned that day they set out to discover the roots of firebending, as if they knew things about each other that no one else was privy to. "It _has_ been four years."

"Zuko," she said, and this time her smile was genuine. It wouldn't be right of her to come between the way of Aang and the friendships he'd formed with the rest of them. After all, it was Aang himself who changed each of their lives with just his simple presence. She was not so blind to the reactions of her friends when Zuko announced his arrival—happy and hopeful suddenly turned tentative when they glanced in her direction. "Thank you," was all she said.

And Zuko sagged then, a sigh of relief escaping his lips. Sokka had barreled in and hugged them both, no doubt eavesdropping by the door, followed closely by a grinning Toph and an exasperated but smiling Suki. They shared a hug, the first time in years.

Now, after four long years he has arrived, his face such a stark contrast to the twelve-year-old boy she remembered in the recesses of her mind, that she had stuttered and hesitated upon meeting him. He had landed in the courtyard of the palace, Appa's touchdown shaking the trees and stirring the wind, and almost immediately was flocked by people who wanted to see the Avatar after so long. Toph had pushed her way forward, creating a channel that parted the crowd, and with her Sokka and Zuko walked, smiling widely. Katara had stood back, watching behind the curtains of a large ornamental window facing the yard, feeling silly for her hesitation.

"Katara," Sokka had said, his brow furrowed in understanding. It seemed that through the years her brother had grown up as well. All of them had. There was a maturity in each of their gazes, a wisdom that came from participating in a war as children.

"Sokka," Katara had replied. She drew her arms around herself and managed a smile. "I'll stay here."

And Sokka had nodded, understanding her without a need for words. He had hugged her and joined Toph and Zuko in meeting Aang. Now, Katara, looking down into the yard and observing the interaction, felt a distant sort of happiness bubble up in her heart. _Aang was here. Finally._

He was twenty now, two years younger than her. He looked wizened, Katara supposed, his eyebrows thick and his jaw strong. His cheekbones had somehow become more prominent, almost severely high, all traces of fat left over from childhood gone, a mixture of both puberty and fasting. His skin was tan, no doubt from the hours spent meditating under the sun and riding the wind. He was taller than ever, taller than she thought he could ever be, his form lithe and compact, all muscle and strength. Zuko and Sokka took turns hugging him and she noticed they only came up to Aang's ears. He had to bend at the waist to hug Toph and Suki, a wide smile on his face. Different, so different, and yet the same.

He was devastatingly handsome. Exotic, with his gray irises, upturned eyes, broad nose and sharp jaw. His beauty was one that she hasn't seen in her lifetime, different from the men of the Earth Kingdom, the Fire Nation and the Water Tribe. In his absence, he had somehow turned into a man. If it weren't for the blue of his tattoos and his familiar orange robes, ceremonial and draped for the occasion, she would not have recognized him.

The palace was alight with festivities, celebrating the Avatar's return. She could no more keep her distance as dinner was served, but she kept her head down and moved to sit with her tribe. Servants bustled around him, offering him trays of food and drink. Her eyes narrowed as she observed several women, presumably of royal descent, judging by their gowns of chiffon and silk and their heavy jewels of gold, crowding around him, trying to capture his interest. Politicians from the three nations were flanking his sides, desperate to earn the Avatar's favor. Katara supposes Aang has that effect on everyone—it is the charisma and the charm that comes along with one who possesses great power.

And power he has. Even in her position all the way on the other side of the room-length table, joined by her father and brother on either side, she could feel on the surface of her skin the power he radiated. It was a constant, light presence, like the fall of her elaborate robes around her body. Present and felt, but something you can miss after a while. She wondered if he had somehow gotten more powerful during his training and search for enlightenment on the mountains, or if it was her who had her senses become more susceptible to the palpable buzz after a period of being away from him for so long. After all, it had been easy to grow numb to it from constantly being at his side for years. The first she had felt of it was the moment she cradled his head to her chest, his skin warm despite being encased in an iceberg. Now, she wondered how she had ever forgotten the feeling.

When he turned his head towards her direction, as if sensing her stare, she quickly lowered her eyes and focused on her food. When she looked up a few moments later, his attention was on a simpering young woman beside him. They hadn't had the chance to interact after that, with Aang immediately being swept away with political matters she could not care less about. She had retreated to her room, eyes trained onto the full moon, and tried to fall asleep despite the flashes of gray behind her eyelids.

It was on the midnight of his arrival that the rebels attacked, planning to ambush them in their sleep. Toph had awoken first, alerting everyone of their presence by producing a rumbling earthquake that broke the battalion's ranks and roused them from their sleep. Katara had jumped out the window dressed in only her sleeping robe, her heart pounding in her chest, already pulling out all the water in the ponds dispersed around the palace.

Now, Katara dreadfully regrets not wearing any sort of protection before jumping out her window. She grinds her teeth in an attempt to hide her pain as the water slowly draws out the arrow embedded into her flesh. She closes her eyes, her limbs weak and her breath short as she sways in place, dizzy from the pain. Fresh blood pours from the wound and the glowing water around her arm flickers out as she loses concentration. Her fingers are tingling and starting to numb, immobilized.

The earth shakes underneath her feet, snapping her out of her stupor. The water orb breaks and seeps through the dirt. Katara blinks through the pain and starts to sift the water out of the earth, but her mind is shot. The water responds to her movement but doesn’t rise.

The sounds of scuffle get her attention. Slowly, she pushes her head up to watch through the cracks of the earthen tent Toph had created for her. A flash of orange enters her vision. For the first time in a long while, she sees Aang fight. He was still dressed in his ceremonial robes, no doubt he was kept awake by some of the more invasive visitors of the palace. He fought more or less the same, she thinks, preferring to evade and dodge and occasionally sending gusts of wind to push his opponents back whenever they got too close. He narrowly dodges a sharpened rock that was hurtling so fast in his direction that Katara doesn't even see it until it cuts through the tree behind him cleanly, the trunk splitting off with an almighty crack. Katara's heart sinks. These rebels were planning to kill him.

He raises a column of earth around himself as arrows rain down on him from every direction. Panic grips her lungs, making her breathing even more difficult. She wants to be out there, to help, but in her condition she is useless. She would do more harm than good, and so she stays put despite the righteous anger burning through her heart. She watches as Aang redirects a fireblast to the chest, his movements agile as he rotates his arm at the elbow, extinguishing the flame. He raises his fist and punches the man in front of him clean on the jaw. Katara blinks in surprise and recoils slightly.

Aang was not the kind of person who hit people with his hands. Often, his bending did it for him, and usually with a gust of wind. She stares, stunned, as Aang spins on his heel and kicks the man around the ear. He crumples to the ground. Another one rushes behind him, a waterbender with a sickle made of sharpened ice. Katara felt a scream of warning bubbling out her mouth, but Aang has already noticed the presence. He kicks behind him in an arch, forming a crescent of fire around his form. The weapon melts but immediately reforms as the rebel catches himself. Aang turns and faces the rebel, the two fingers of his hand held out, his expression blank. Katara watches as he ducks a slice to the face, twists, grips the other’s wrist with a strong hand and brings his fingers down, cutting the weapon right at the hilt. The rebel, stunned into inaction in his surprise, his thoughts no doubt similar to Katara’s— _did he just cut through the thickened ice with his fingers without even touching it_ —does not even have the chance to defend himself as Aang elbows him in the nose. He stumbles backward with a shout, his hand over his face and blood trickling down his mouth, but Aang only twists once more to kick at his head with the heel of his boot. A sick crack echoes through the courtyard as the rebel crumples to the ground.

Katara turns away, unable to bring herself to continue watching him. Instead, she tries to absorb the water mixed with the earth at her feet, her mind alight with confusion. Her hand trembles as she brings the glowing water to her injured shoulder—from pain or from the newfound fear in her heart, she isn’t quite certain which.

* * *

Katara isn’t sure when the tremors cease and the sounds of battle die, but she knows it couldn’t have been long. She can hear Toph’s voice as she interrogates each captured rebel, her tone intimidating as she coaxes out truths. Sokka is shouting somewhere off to the side, his voice similar to Toph’s, no doubt trying to appear as intimidating as her.

“Where’s Katara?” Came Aang’s voice, the first she’s heard for years. She hadn’t had the chance to talk to him nor hear his voice at the banquet—he was too far away and anything he might’ve said was drowned out by the sounds of cheers and praises from the crowd. It sounded the same, Katara surmises, but not quite. Somehow it had become surprisingly deep, deeper than her brother’s even, with a hard edge to it that wasn’t there four years ago. Come to think of it, his fighting style had changed too. Katara’s mind works furiously. _Just what had happened to him in those four years?_

Toph pauses. Katara assumes she was pointing at the earthen tent, and only a few seconds later she hears a rush of air as he leapt towards her direction. She plants her feet to avoid being toppled over as the tent sheaths itself back into the ground with a wave of his hand.

Katara doesn’t look up as his shadow falls over her. Aang crouches and levels his gaze with hers, his face worried, so different from the blank exterior from when he was fighting. Katara couldn’t help the shiver that runs through her from his deep gaze, intensified by his proximity, his eyelids more upturned and sharper than she remembers, giving him an almost cruel countenance. She remembers the coldness with which he had fought with earlier and curls in on herself, confused beyond belief, scolding herself for ever thinking that Aang could ever look _cruel_. Not Aang, the boy who asked to go penguin-sledding with her, the boy who innocently wove her a necklace without knowing it looked like he was asking her hand for marriage. Not Aang, the boy who told her that the hardest thing to do was to forgive, his eyes shining with the ghosts of his ancestors, but allowed her to ride Appa to hunt her mother's killer all the same. He was all the good she had ever known in this world.

He must have mistaken her shiver for the frigid winds of near dawn, because he unties the sash around his shoulder and wraps the cloth around her, protecting her exposed skin. He waves his hand around her form. Immediately, the air warms, and Katara shivers again despite herself, the casual display of power turning her insides with something she can’t quite name.

He pauses as he sees the rivulets of half-dried blood coating her arm. She knows it must’ve looked like quite a fright, running down her elbows and onto her palms and fingers like thickened raindrops. The only water she had was spent on healing her wound, and she’d disposed of the dirtied, bloodied liquid afterward. She couldn’t even bring herself to bloodbend the rest away, despite it being her own and outside of someone's body.

“Katara,” he starts, his voice low. Katara’s heart pounds from the sinister edge to his tone, one he has never managed to sound like even in his most anguished of moments. Belatedly, Katara realizes that it was probably because he was a child back then, unable to reach the baritone he was speaking in right now. “What happened?”

Katara purses her mouth. Through the years, she has spent hours upon hours thinking of the day they meet again, making up scenarios and entire conversations in her head. She imagined they would reunite passionately, the accumulation of years of yearning. She imagined there would be hesitation at first, but that Aang would pursue her, his smile genuine and kind, as he always did. He would gently break the walls she's made around herself, like he always has. This Aang was not the same person she envisioned in her head. He was patient, yes, and he was calm—the same calm that always accompanied him. But this Aang had a glint to his eye that was unfamiliar to her. There was a tightness in his jaw that was not there before. Never did she think that the first thing she would say to him after a long time was: “An arrow.”

Aang’s eyes harden, and his gaze flits toward the discarded arrow by his feet, lying in a pool of blood. Katara's blood. She hurries to backtrack. “I’ve healed it already; I’m fine.”

He reaches over and places a gentle hand over her arm. She couldn’t help the hiss of pain that escapes her lips as his fingers, calloused and harder than she remembers, prods at the muscle. Katara breathes shallowly through her nose, the touch sending sparks of pain, and a little bit of something else, down her arm. “What are you doing?” She whispers.

Aang continues to feel her skin, using two hands now, one placed hard around her clavicle and another on her elbow. His palms are warm and dry. A bizarre thought crosses her mind—she was dressed sparely, in a slip dress provided by the palace, torn in several places from the fight, hanging on with one strap, the other cut through along with her arm. This was the most skin she’d shown him, even before from when she was teaching him waterbending. Despite the pain she was in, a hard blush manages to consume her face. A quick glance towards Aang’s face had the thought extinguished in a second. His eyes were hard and placid, the grays flat and stormy, his face tight in concealed anger.

"Aang," she starts to say, but a scream tore from her lips instead as Aang abruptly twists her elbow while pushing her clavicle forward. Her scream echoes through the night, along with the sickening pop of the joint slotting into place, the pain and shock shooting through her body and up her neck. She sways forward, delirious, and Aang moves to cradle her head on his chest. The sounds of people rushing towards her direction belatedly reach her ears, but then suddenly someone shouts, and several things happen at once.

"Look out!" That was Toph's voice, shouted over the commotion of people rushing towards the source of her scream, alert at the possibility of her being attacked. The earth beneath her gave a rumble, a thick slab of stone rising just behind Aang, but it was slow, Toph no doubt as exhausted as the rest of them. Katara, through the haze of her pain, sees the glint of several poised archers hiding in the trees, their bows trained onto the back of Aang's head. Katara's eyes widen, the world slows around her, and desperately she calls forth whatever liquid she can find. Her blood rises from the ground and slowly moves to form an arch behind Aang's head to protect him. Her movement was sluggish, but still she tries to command her blood to freeze. Her heart pounds from the knowledge that she was too late.

Her lips open to cry out, her eyes shut, the whistling of arrows loud and roaring in her ears. Half a second, and those arrows will bury themselves into Aang's head.

A second goes by. The courtyard is silent. Half expecting to see Aang crumpled before her and half praying to the gods that no harm had come to him, she opens her eyes, and immediately gasps and backs away as she comes face to face with a sharpened arrowhead barely an inch away from the middle of her forehead. Her injured shoulder screams in pain as she lands on it.

Aang is as still as a statue in front of her. Katara blinks, her heart gives a painful lurch, and her jaw slacks as she stares at him. She knew that everyone was staring at Aang, stunned into silence just like her.

There were multiple arrows all pointed to Aang's head, from every direction except the front. Each and every single one of them was frozen, hovering in midair, barely an inch away from making contact and sinking into his skull. The closest to his nape was covered in blood—her own blood, from when she'd desperately tried to form an arch around him but wasn't able to. The silence was only broken as Aang abruptly punches the ground. Columns of earth rise out from behind him and shoot toward the branches of the trees where the archers were positioned. The branches groan and splinter, and the archers jump out of the way, making their escape. Aang turns and reaches out with the two of his fingers on each hand. For a brief second Katara thinks that he was going to summon lightning, the finger position similar to Azula's so many years ago. But the crackle that never fails to raise her hairs on end and the bluish light that accompanies lightningbending doesn't come. Instead, the arrows still hovering in midair spin toward the direction of the trees and move back, as if being loaded unto an invisible string. Aang points toward the archers, and immediately the arrows whiz towards them, a sharp whistling noise from the force of their launch accompanying them. The arrows spin and curve around the branches, an impossible feature if it were shot out a bow. One by one the archers fall toward the ground as they were shot down by their own arrows.

"Aang!" Katara gasps, and through her pain she manages to stumble toward the fallen archers. She looks wildly behind her, at the soldiers and the Kyoshi Warriors frozen into a stupor from the drastic turn of events. She spots Toph, Zuko, Sokka and Suki from the crowd, their expressions identical masks of horror. She couldn't bring herself to look at Aang.

Instead, she crouches over to the nearest rebel, his face twisted in pain. She draws out water from the tree behind him and the trunk wilts and bows over them. She moves to position it towards the rebel's wounds, the glow of the water illuminating his injury, and gasps at what she sees.

The rebel had an arrow embedded unto his shoulder, dislocating the bone, exactly like what happened to her.

All of them had.

* * *

The dungeon is dark and musty, the air still and dry. The hallway is lit by torches embedded unto the stone walls, casting eerie shadows on the floor and over desolate faces. The elongated shadows of the cell bars flicker along the walls in time with the sway of the flames.

Katara sits by the cot nearest the cell bars, tending to the wounds of the last of the captured rebel, an archer, Katara concludes, looking at his attire and the arrow jutting out his shoulder. She slowly draws out the arrowhead, immediately enveloping the arm with glowing water as blood pours out. Katara’s eyes droop with exhaustion, having been tending to all of the wounded by herself and only one other healer.

To her left lies the man whom Aang had taken down with an elbow to the nose. Minutes earlier she'd fixed his broken nose, washed out the trails of blood from his mouth to his chest, and slowly coaxed him to drink the brew of hypnotics she'd made to help him sleep through the headache persisting from where he'd gotten kicked. Suki stands rigid by her right. Ty Lee is stationed on the post directly in front of them, while the rest of the Kyoshi warriors are dispersed among the numerous cells.

Katara's right arm was held up by a band of cloth fashioned into a sling, her shoulder still tender. Despite the stale, warm air, she draws the orange robes draped around her closer to herself. She crosses her legs, trying to hide them from sight. She was still unable to dress herself properly, having rushed towards the dungeons with the rest of the wounded rebels in tow. Zuko’s soldiers and the Kyoshi warriors had successfully detained each member of the rebellion, and the identified leader was being interrogated on the lowest level of the underground cavern by Toph and Sokka.

She’d lost sight of Aang after the commotion that occurred immediately after he shot down those archers. She’d crouched down in front of one, gasped and stumbled away, and the rest of the soldiers and Kyoshi warriors had sprung into action. In the haze of activity and transport into the dungeon, he’d somehow managed to disappear.

“It’s karma, huh.” The man she’s tending to suddenly says. His voice is rueful, his face a strange contortion between amused, defeated and pained. Katara freezes, the glowing water wrapped over the man’s shoulder stilling along with her hand. Suki shifts beside her.

The man glances over her white face down to her injured shoulder and chuckles drily. “The Avatar,” he clarifies. “He shot us down the same way we did to you.”

She blinks and eyes Suki, whose attention was also diverted towards the man. Suki furrows her brows, the paint on her face melted by the temples. Dried sweat tracks cut through her painted forehead. She doesn’t say anything. Katara looks down and continues her work. “Aang doesn’t believe in karma,” she says, purposefully using his name.

The man barks out a laugh and gestures to his injured shoulder and the unconscious man lying on the other cot. “Didn’t seem like that tonight.”

Katara doesn’t say anything else, just gestures for Suki to come near. Suki strides over without question, grabs the man’s elbow while Katara stills his shoulder, and abruptly twists and slots the bone back into place. The man’s scream echoes throughout the corridor.

Katara stands to leave after palpating his now intact shoulder, checking to see if the bone had been correctly reset. The man breathes a wheezing laugh as she turns toward the cell door. “Turns out you don’t know him as much as you thought,” he says from behind her, his voice lilting.

Katara slams the gate closed.

Suki walks beside her after locking the cell. They are silent as they reach the end of the corridor and descend further into the dungeons, towards the level of the interrogation room. The staircase is narrow and the ceiling is low. Torches hung on the walls light the way as the stairs curve and extend deeper into the ground.

"It's not that bad, you know," Suki says suddenly, her voice quiet. It rings loud anyway in the heavy silence of the underground.

Katara looks over her shoulder at Suki, who is climbing down the stairs behind her. Suki sees the bewildered expression on Katara's face and shrugs, her face apologetic. Her armor clinks together from the movement. "What Aang did, I mean."

Katara looks away.

"Sokka clubbed that one guy pretty hard," Suki says, much softer now. "You know, the one whose temple you patched up? And Toph broke the ribs of about two or three of those men when she hit them with a boulder square on the chest."

Suki continues speaking through Katara's silence. "Zuko singed off the entire right side of that earthbender's head," her voice quiets. "Even the Kyoshi warriors did a number on them."

Katara's steps slow. She sighs, remembering the number of slashes she'd healed, distinctive cuts from the Kyoshi warriors' sharpened fans. Her tender shoulder burns with phantom pain. "They were going to kill Aang," Suki reminds her gently. "It was either his life or that."

This strikes Katara deep in the chest. She turns toward Suki and offers her a tired smile. In the four years of Aang's absence, she was able to build stronger relationships with the rest of the group. She'd always been close with each of them, but with Aang's leaving came the realization that she'd spent more time with him than others, and often she would find herself alone, lost without Aang's company. It had taken her a while to find happiness somewhere else.

In particular, Suki, Toph and her grew the closest, a bond forged by their shared femininity. Suki was always wise and understood her motherly tendencies, while Toph was brazen, unafraid to say what mattered even when it hurt. They became her closest confidants.

"It's just," Katara sighs. "I was just surprised, is all. I didn't think he was capable of..."

Suki brushes her injured arm with a gentle hand. "It wasn't that bad," she repeats what she said earlier. "You should've seen his fight with Fire Lord Ozai."

At this, Katara pauses. Suki stills beside her. "I haven't, actually." She admits. "I was fighting Azula alongside Zuko in the palace. Have you?"

Suki nods. "Just a bit of the fight. We were on an airship, Sokka, Toph, and I. We watched a little off to the side after sabotaging the rest of the ships."

"How was he?" Katara asks, her voice betraying her curiosity. It had never occurred to her to ask Aang what happened that day, and Aang hadn't either. Ozai had been captured alive and fully intact, with only a few deep abrasions and gashes. Aang himself was in a similar state. She hadn't assumed the worst, given that their injuries weren't severe.

"He was," Here Suki pauses, frowning. "He was," Suki tries again, her eyes trained toward the stone ceiling, thinking. "Frightening." She finally says after a long while.

Katara blinks in surprise. "Frightening?" She couldn't help but echo.

"Yes," Suki whispers. "He entered the Avatar state and encased himself in this solid sphere of air, with a tight ring of each element spinning around it. It was frightening to witness."

"Was he..." Katara starts to ask after a moment of silence, but trails off. They continue their walk toward the interrogation room. Suki glances at her and immediately understands her question.

"He was in complete control." Suki answers, her face sympathetic.

Katara breathes out, but whether it was from relief or something else, she isn't sure. "And they fought?"

"Well," Suki grimaces. "It was more of a chase, really. Aang was relentless. It was almost overwhelming."

Katara's heart sinks low into her chest. "What is?"

"The incredible amount of power," Suki's voice sounded far away. "He was shifting entire spires of rock with a wave of his hand; his fire was so strong we could feel it from far away. The air sphere he encased himself in was so solid he actually drove halfway down into the ground with it."

Katara's eyes catch unto the flickers of the torches hung on the walls, and imagines winds so strong they could pulverize rock.

"I thought he was going to kill him," Suki whispers, almost ashamed. Katara didn't blame her. Everyone, including her, was adamant about the Fire Lord's downfall, even if it meant his death. Aang was the only one greatly against the notion. She knew that if it were anyone else in his position, they would not have hesitated to kill the Fire Lord. "He was gearing for it too. He spoke in this ominous voice, and raised a vortex of the elements, intending to drive it straight to his heart. It was unlike anything I've ever heard nor seen before."

Katara shivers despite the warm air. She knew Aang hadn't really killed the Fire Lord, but she couldn't help but think that _he could have_ , and that _he had every right to_. When she saw the Fire Lord in shackles behind Aang, alive yet murderous, she wasn't really surprised. Zuko beside her was silent. She wasn't sure if he was glad Aang hadn't killed the Fire Lord, since despite how cruel he had been, he was still Zuko's father, no matter how vile a father he was. Later, Zuko tells her the same, but also admits that he wished for just a moment that Aang had killed him instead, if only to make everything easier.

Katara vaguely remembers thinking the same, especially when a riot had ensued when people learned that the Fire Lord wasn't dead. And another, demanding Zuko's death and Ozai's return to the throne.

Suki was still speaking. "At the last minute, Aang stopped and turned his back on Ozai. His tattoos lost their light, and he looked like he was giving up. I remember Sokka screaming in my ear, yelling at him to never turn his back on his opponent, which was one of the most basic rules of fighting, he says, or something like that."

Katara manages a weak smile. Suki bumps her on her good shoulder as they exit the staircase.

"Of course, Ozai took advantage of his weakness, or so he says, but Aang must've seen his attack coming, because he held him down with columns of earth. And then," Suki trails off.

Katara looks over at Suki. Her eyes were misty, her gaze eight years into the past. "It was a sight I would never forget."

"What is?" Katara asks, already knowing the answer.

Suki looks down. "Sokka went silent, you know. When Aang did what he did afterward."

Katara nods, understanding. Sokka's silence meant something otherworldly must be happening. And there was nothing more otherworldly than someone having their bending taken from them. "He took away Ozai's bending," Katara finishes.

"Yes," Suki agrees, her voice quiet. "I didn't know that was what was happening back then. But the beams of light that shot out their mouths and eyes, the way it almost seemed like Aang was being consumed until his light overpowered Ozai..." Suki sighs. "It was something I'd never forget."

Silent, they share a look of understanding. The flames on the walls cast shadows over the reverent expression on Suki's face. The reds of her face paint made her eyes deeper, her irises glinting with memories of eight years ago. Katara hugs Suki with her good arm.

"Thank you," Katara whispers, and together they enter the interrogation room, her heart heavy with realization.

**Author's Note:**

> There was always this thought in my head, about characters that seem flat or one-sided. Aang was mostly portrayed as naive and happy-go-lucky, though we see glimpses of just how conflicted he really is. Grief is an ambiguous thing. It is something that stays even though you've seemingly convinced yourself you've moved on. It is the characters who push through their pain that inspire me the most. And Aang, who carried the world on his shoulders at twelve, faced with the dilemma of going against your beliefs to end the war, his people taken away from him--I refuse to believe that there isn't some sort of darkness behind his cheerful front, one he's hiding so well that it took years for even the one closest to him to see.


End file.
